Beer and Brownies

It seems that the last thing that I wrote was about moving up to Idaho. That was a year ago. I have done a lot since then and at the moment I am not in the mood to edit what I am typing this night. I do not even know if anyone is reading anything I am typing anyways. This has always been a good form of therapy for me anyways.

So, what is it that I need to have therapy for? Well, I do not think that I will dive into the detail of my own metal pathways of craziness, but lets just say that I my trust was completely abused at one point in my life and I need spend time dumping it all out for awhile.

Well, since I mentioned already that this is just free hand session without editing I guess I will just get to it.

As I write this it is a beer and brownie night. The day was slower than usual and I spent the most of the day reading stories about an old man and a boy. They were all from the viewpoint of the boy and his time with the old man learning to hunt, fish, and life lessons along with it. My grandfather in law fell asleep last week and it was he who gave these books to me. I can not put them down. It might be the best that I have read. It has been interesting to read someone who writes like he is talking to you in a conversation over drinks. It seem natural as if there is no other way around it.

Since the last time I was on here I spoke the move from the southern California desert to the south west of Idaho, I might as well explain that last year in more detail.

This is Idaho. It is now the fastest growing state in the Union. It is also the second smallest state in the union. There is a small percentage of locals who think the californians are changing the state into a liberal state. When in fact the Californians who are moving here are not liberals, but libretarians. The liberal Californians who are leaving California are moving to Arizona. So, the people who are moving here from CA are actually making this state more into the state that the so called republicans think they are. Which is funny. The sin of the republicans is that they are hypocrites, they talk of small government while expanding it. The democrats sin is that they actually believe the absolute crap they preach because it makes them money, they would tell preach flat earth theory if they thought they could make money off of it.

Which brings us to our current president. The funny thing is both sides hate him because he actually does what he says, and nobody has a clue how to handle it. There has not been a person to do what they say they are going to do in such a long time that the USA is pulling it hair out trying to understand what it is that is going on.

You really want make your political head spin, read the speeches that JFK did not give that he was supposed to give the the days after his death. Do you think liberals wanted to hear those things??

Ok, I just realized that I was going a little off the subject.   Must be the brownies, or beer. I have been in this state fore a year that has been an amazing struggle of a year. The spot that we are in is right where the hight desert and the foothills of the mountains of some large range seem to meet. The wilderness up here is something that I seem to only have read in a book. A few hours east of here Hemingway himself bought a place where he could observe nature and write some of his works.

I have been taking walks to the north of the road that I have been living and there seems to be a house every five acres. After a couple of miles up the winding road into some smaller hills, it begins to give way to the sage brush and barbed wire fences from large ranches that used to be here years past. These ranches where sold off piece by piece to build five acre estates to people who just end up paying other people to keep up the land. These beautiful hills off sage and grass hide thousands of tiny little quail that flush every twenty feet when I walk through the hills trying to get some clarity on things going through my head from the daily grind. Grind, I hate that word, people always seem to jump that word off a cliff when things are tough but they want to seem as if they are being positive about the amount of useless busy work they are doing and how it will all pay off in the end. Most people are lazy though. When I mean lazy, I mean that they are willing to work on things that take up there time for hours upon hours, but when it comes to the one thing they need to do to reach te next level (you know, go out of there bubble) they just can not do it. You know exactly what I am talking about, these people have an excuse not to do anything. They also as the experts at why things do not work out, but it is never there fault.

It is almost midnight. I do not know if that is significant or not, but it is. In less than a minute it will be my second sons second birthday. He is at his grandomthers house and I miss him so. He was born on saint patrick's day. Watched The Quiet Man on the day he was born and have watched it many times since. It is one of my favorite movies of all time. They have only been gone just over a week, and they are coming back next week, but I am a wreck.

I do not function without my family under my roof. Yet, only about 4-5 months out of the year do I have my whole family under my roof. When I think of it I feel as if I am being punished for my past in some way. I wish it was simple, I wish I could just quickly understand the many questions that travel inbetween my neurons. I wish I could control the neurotransmitters that bounce around the expanse that is my mind.

Well, I have been sitting here venting about things that seem to be important to me at some level or another.

Once I saw the sun rise above the the valley I grew up in. It was a beautiful morning that I did not seem to remember until I was much older and thinking of times that were long gone. It was a time that I did not think of anything but the sunrise and not think to remember it beyond. This moment creeps into my memory almost too much, I do not know if I like the memory or not, but it is there. It is such a memory that I have blocked it to keep myself of thinking about times past that can not change or help the current situation. There has been too much of this talk already and I will not get into details beyond the sunrise.

With this all being said I am now gong to wrap this up. With my old post I used to like putting a quote or a Bible verse at the end of it all, but sense this is all free hand without any editing or foresight I cannot think of anything that anyone else has said that would close this up any better.

That is all, the beer is gone and the brownies are fighting me. I love too much, I am a romantic but no one seems to understand or care.

The Move

I know that many people are already aware of this, but I have not made any large formal announcements. This forum is not a huge shout to the world about the goings on in my life either, but I like to get things out this way too. We are moving. We are leaving Blythe. We are leaving California. This state has been going downhill for a very long time and I have no desire to raise my children in it. 

Idaho

We are moving to Eagle Idaho. We have no family up there, though we do know a few people (four). The reasons for our move are simple and complicated. We wish to start on on own. Most importantly this is where God wants us. We have found a nice home to rent and hopefully will have an office space soon. It has been a little stressful and the worst part is the packing. We have too much stuff. I wish it were easier to get rid of things and downsize. My wife is better than it than I am by leaps and bounds. When we moved to Blythe we had a house that was over stuffed with junk. Now we have a house and an office to move. Plus we have 3 dogs, 6 chickens, and a goat. Since I graduated high school I have moved 13 times. This will be 14, and the last few times I have said they would be my last. I guess I should stop saying that because God keeps me moving. I enjoy the next adventure, just dislike the packing and unpacking of it all. 

You still might be wondering why Idaho? Months back when the idea of leaving California came to us we spent a lot time looking into other states that might work well for us. We considered Arizona, Nevada, Pennsylvania, Oregon, but settled on the second least populated state in the Union, Idaho. Without going into numerous details, it just felt right in every way. We have things that we would like to do with our family, that we can do up there that we cannot do anywhere else. Idaho is also still within a good days drive of most of our family, so we can still visit and so can they. 

That is all I have on the move at this point, except that we will be up there by April 1st. 

I have my reasons

I have decided to start all over with this blogging thing.  So many things have changed and happened since the start of Hoodie Stories that it is only appropriate to start off as fresh as can be.  Tonight I am up while the rest of the house is sick. While it is nice to be able to feel good, and not have a fever and all the other unpleasantries that accompany it, I am tired and know that I will not sleep. With that being known, I have sat in front of my computer, searching through old files, trying to figure out all that I can squeeze onto a amazon gift card (as many books as possible without upsetting the wife with too large of an addition to my library), and stumbling across my old blog. I never really thought anyone actually read it. I that Google (1x10^100) tracks every single person to stumbles across it, but did anyone actually read it? I did get the random comment here an there from some family and friends, but did anyone else stick around and actually read it?

With that question looming, I am starting a new one. I do not know if I will maintain it any better than the last one. I started the last one as a place to share and vent all I felt I needed to, and that is probably what will happen here. So without any further discussion I will begin with what will probably be a random selection of my thoughts put down in paragraph form.

The last thing I wrote was published on the 21st of August 2015. It was just something I needed to write down, and this was the medium to which I wrote it to. Now that it has been over a year, I'm not really sure what I want to say. Things are in flux at the moment. Before I continue, my family is fine, my marriage is solid and I am very happy. 

It's this whole responsible adult/father/husband thing. What are the best decisions to be made about this and that for my family. The places I have been, the person I was compared to the person I am, all has changed and yet nothing has. 

It's funny because I did not know what to say after that last paragraph, but as soon as I finished typing I had to take care of someone. I felt that I was going to have to read my book, or maybe try and sleep, but I now have a new since of energy. This is probably a bad thing since I do have to work tomorrow. 

I did get to go to Prescott with my wife for a few days and we loved it. It was just us two and happened to be on my birthday. This was the first time that we have been able to have a few days to ourselves since our honeymoon. It was well spent and worth the wait. We are well rested and needed to be for the impending sickness that has swept the kids and her.

There have been moments in my life that I have been extremely scared and excited at the same time about some decision I was about to make. Now it seems that those moments are not too much different except the scared part is about the consequences that my decision with have on a great number of other people.

I have a dear friend of mine. We used to do the same things and we did it well. We both came to a place in the road of our lives and decided to take different directions. They went one way, I went another. We still keep in contact, but very seldom do we speak. The last time we did was hard. I pray fro them and only wish for them to be free and safe. I can not imagine the kinds of things that they must do to survive, and knowing that these things are part of what keeps my family safe warms my heart. I can only hope that there is an end to it all soon, and that we will see each other again. If you know someone who has seen terrible things in order to keep you safe, who was willing to die (and sometimes hoping for it), in order for you to live your life, thank them. The mental strain and anguish that they go through is almost too much.

It seems that I am passing out in my chair here, this is a good sign. I could use the sleep.